Welcome to the World, Little Gavin!!

So, I'm finally sitting down to try to punch out a good birth story about my little Gavin-nugget's arrival into the world. I may end up writing this over several sittings, so we'll see how much I can get down at one time. Pre-warning, this will be completely long-winded and full of all kinds of little details but #1, I know my mommy friends will enjoy it and #2, I know I will appreciate it as time goes by as I might not remember all the details. Read only if you have the time and patience to take on this project! Seriously. This thing is going to be like, novel status. Let's get started. Readysetgo!

So everything kicked off at the fantastic time of 3:47am on Monday, February 20th. I was sound asleep in bed, and kind of awoke on my own. Not really sure why. Although, while pregnant, I woke up in the night ALL the time to pee and just went back to sleep, no big deal. This time I awoke, rolled on my back a little and felt a trickle down below, that INSTANTLY I knew wasn't pee. Didn't feel like pee coming out at all. I jumped up, tried to cup my hand underneath and ran to the toilet. By the time I got there, my underwear was soaked. My water broke and was not fucking around!! I was just staring in disbelief, just thinking OMG. I knew that this was definitely it, not questionable like when I thought my water might have broke back at 35 weeks.

I thought for a few minutes about going back to sleep. I had stayed up really late just watching tv, until about 1am. So for it to be only 4am was no bueno. I stayed sitting in the bathroom since the fluid just kept coming. I decided to call my mom to let her know. I felt bad waking her up but if this was it, I knew she wouldn't mind and she needed the heads up to get on the road down here to VA. Afterwards, I called Labor & Delivery to ask how long I should wait to come in if my water had broken. They said to come in right away, even though I wasn't having any contractions. Next, I busted out my handy list of ship phone numbers and called to let Nick know it was time. OF COURSE, this was a night he was on duty so he wasn't home. I asked for him and found out he was asleep but they had no problem getting someone to go wake him once I told them the situation. :) He called me back shortly later and said he'd be home soon.

While I waited, my mind was freaking out! In a good way though. I was like omg, what do I do? My hospital bag was packed except for things I used daily, like toiletry items and such. So I tried to figure out what miscellaneous things I needed to grab. Then I thought things like maybe I should get dressed, maybe I should brush my teeth. I'm pretty sure I even straightened my hair since I'd went to sleep with it wet from showering. I was still relatively calm since I wasn't in any pain. My water was still coming out pretty consistently this whole time, but thankfully I had bought some heavy duty pads a couple days earlier. Nick finally got home and we finished getting ready to go, including packing him an overnight bag. We left the house around 4:30 or 5 and were on our way! During the drive there, Nick said something that made me laugh and with that laugh came a huge GUSH. Oh my god. We were just a couple minutes from the hospital but I was like omg! We gotta get there NOW so I can get changed or set up with something or just.. I dunno!!! I was afraid of dripping all over the place on the way to L&D on the 4th floor. Once out of the car, I asked Nick if it looked like I peed my pants and he said yes. Dammit. At least it was ridiculously early and no one was around to see!

We got to the triage window and got taken back to check me in. I got out of my poor wet pants and in a gown and on a table, where I continued to leak, haha. At least they're used to these kinds of messes! I got checked in, got my IV put in and my cervix checked, which was still at 1cm, or a "loose" l cm/almost 2cm. Not bad I guess! After what felt like a long time, we got our room where we settled in for the long haul, however long it would take. We were both exhausted, and I wasn't contracting so we tried to lay down and grab some sleep before my mom and Aunt Lorri arrived. They got there at about 8:30am, and I still wasn't contracting so I was relieved they got there without missing anything.

Now, I don't remember every little thing that happened, let alone the order everything happened but I'll do the best I can. I know it was around 9am when I started contracting. To help me dilate more, they inserted a foley bulb. She said it may be done getting me to 3cm in a few minutes, or may take much longer. I remember laying on the bed trying to relax and suddenly it popped out and fell on the floor. It startled me and I gasped, cause for some reason I thought I'd done something and it wasn't supposed to do that. Once the nurse came back she told me that just meant it was done doing its job. It only took about 10 minutes so that was pretty sweet.

 They offered me a painkiller through my IV, and I was all for it. The nurse warned it may make me feel loopy and wow, she was right. I got a rush of feeling spinny and loopy but felt pretty good. Also, I'm not sure what time I noticed, but I know at one point I was tracking the contractions by the clock on the wall and they were 3-5 minutes apart. So me, Nick, mom and Lorri all hung out and just generally passed time, especially since the hospital didn't yet consider me in actual labor. At some point in the day, around 4 or 5 people came in the room and rushed to all the monitors, and the nurse asked me to change sides I was laying on. Things were really calm so when they pulled an oxygen mask over my face I was wondering what was going on. They were all really good at not being frantic and making me panic. I think the issue was the baby's heartrate dropped. He was a little turd cause several times throughout the day I had to change how I was laying, although this was the only time people rushed in like that. My poor aunt didn't know what was happening and cried a bit once things calmed down, poor thing. This was probably the biggest drama of the delivery, thank goodness. I was calm when it happened but I don't know if I would've been if it happened again!

 Around 2-3 pm is when I believe the contractions started getting bad. This was probably around the time I got my epidural, cause I was utterly miserable. I had weathered the contractions for around 6 hours so I was ready. Around 5pm is when they considered me in active labor. I was feeling the contractions, which thankfully were painless, but I certainly felt a deep pressure, which felt like the baby was pushing himself straight downwards. By this point, I was 4 cm and disappointed in how slow I was progressing. Was I in for one of those 24+ hour labors?! Oh boy. My disappointment didn't last long, because my next check at 6pm had me at 5cm!! They must've felt I was progressing super fast, since they checked me again 20 minutes later and I was 7cm!! I started freaking out a little bit at this point and teared up a bit because it hit me how close I was to him being born. I can't even describe it. Crazyness.

This fast progression was a little short lived, since my next check almost 3 hours later was only 8cm. Pretty far dilated, but it took me 3 hours to get there. I couldn't help feeling a bit discouraged again. I could tell though that the contractions were getting more intense and we were gearing up for little nugget to be ready soon. Ohhhhhh man.

At 11pm I had my final check, because I was 10cm. I heard the doctor say I was "complete". However, they said we would start pushing in about an hour, to give Gavin more time to get as far down as possible, so I wouldn't have as much work to do. During this time, I was so miserable. I'd begun feeling nauseous, so I was munching on ice and at some point the nurse gave me a popsicle cause I was STARVING. I was nervous cause I noticed I had a little more feeling on my right side, and was feeling contractions on that side. I was really scared that I'd feel too much during the actual birth and that I couldn't handle it. I pushed the button for my epidural as many times as possible to try to help. My right side never got back to the same level as my left, but it didn't end up being a big deal, thankfully. My left side ended up being annoying anyway, cause I remember being in postpartum with my left hip still numb as can be, and itching so badly, yet I couldn't relieve it. ugh!

Anyway, the time finally came. The doctor and other medical staff came in, maybe about 7 or 8 in total. It was awkward to have so many people staring at me all spread eagle, but I knew they do this every single day, and I was nothing unusual. Still. My lady parts on full display isn't really something that had happened in front of so many people before that day. At around 12:30ish am, they said we were gonna start pushing. I was really nervous!! In between contractions were my little rest periods and I would ask the doctor if I was doing it right and things like that, haha. I wanted to be sure I was doing the best work possible to get Gavin out. I didn't really feel much going on down there the first couple sets of pushing.

Finally, I started feeling the intense, intense pressure and one of the personnel let slip that they could see the baby's hair. I guess this shocked me or freaked me out, cause it was in the middle of a push and it made me let my breath out and kind of ruined the momentum of the push. I heard later that the Doctor got annoyed and didn't want me to hear those kinds of things. She was absolutely right, cause the Doctor was great. She knew the perfect things to say to motivate me, reassure me and I think each thing she said to help honestly made the delivery so quick and successful. She was great cause she also had Nick do the counting for most of the sets of pushes so he got to participate. Although he was a turd and counted reaaallllyy slow. I was just thinking ugghh I can't hold my breath that long!! He was wonderful; he helped hold my head up and stroked my hair. :) He didn't want to see the carnage of Gavin coming out, and I was ok with that. I didn't want a mirror to see either. Nick was there and that's what was most important to me.

After a few sets of pushing, I was SO ready for it to be over. I don't remember feeling pain, other than some stings on his way out, but I remember how incredibly intense it felt as he was RIGHT THERE and being born. At this point, my motivation was to just make it be over with ASAP and the fact that the doctor said we'd need to use forceps or a vacuum if this final set of pushes didn't get him out. Screw that, I didn't want to have to use any of that so I made those 3 pushes count.

There's not really much to say other than I pushed super hard, everyone was cheering me on and I felt the most awful intensity and then he was here. I think he was just head out when my mom said "look!" and I was like "I dont wanna!!" hahaha. I really didn't want to see my parts down there during everything, although obviously I wouldn't be able to, my logical thinking at that moment didn't realize that. I didn't know right then, but the Doctor cut the cord herself and took him to the little bed to be assessed right away. I'm glad I kind of didn't realize, cause I didn't have the chance to think that anything was wrong. Apparently he just wasn't liking the labor too much and they were concerned about his heartrate dropping. But baby boy was fine. Luckily, no one stood in the way so the whole time he was being wiped off and checked out I could see him and watch him cry. I saw Nick holding his little hand and standing by him and it made my heart melt.

The moments feel all blurred together of the doctor getting me all fixed up and ready to hold my little guy once he was ready. All in all, I pushed for only 25 minutes. He arrived at 12:59am on February 21st weighing 6lb 14oz and 20 in long. And I only needed two little tiny stitches, which the doctor described as not even on the scale that they use to describe severity of tears. So nothing gross like an episiotomy was needed either, thank goodness. I did really well and I'm so glad, since my recovery has been pretty good and I feel great. I'm glad I didn't need any intervention, since any of that could've made recovery a horrible experience. If it wasn't for the epidural making my legs all wobbly, I could've been walking within an hour or so (I was able to walk on my own after about 4 hours).

Anyway, I think this may be a good place to end. I could always do another entry with postpartum related things later. I just definitely wanted to get the delivery down for those who want to read about it and for myself before I start forgetting things. I just hope I didn't already forget anything that I wanted to be sure was in the story. If you read this whole thing, congrats. If not, then I at least still have my long winded recollection of my first baby boy's birth :)

For my Fellow Mommy Friends...

I'm currently drafting the HUGE Birth Story blog entry, but I wanted to post this in the meantime since it's on my mind. I had a really emotional moment today and I guess I'm wondering if anyone else has any advice or comforting words or just... something.

I have been thinking this all week and vocalized it today to Nick. I told him it feels like we haven't gotten to cuddle or love on each other or anything in forever and it sucks. I'm not even talking about sex, since we know that's on hold for a bit. and yes, OF COURSE we knew the baby would give us less time for each other. I am not so dumb and silly I didn't realize this would happen once Gavin was here. That's a given. I guess with Gavin being so fussy at night, my expectation that we'd get a little time at night to snuggle and such is out the window, and I'd hoped it would be a time we'd have together.

My issue is that I didn't realize how much it upset me until I actually said it out loud. I started tearing up and tried not to let Nick see. And I'm tearing up now typing this out. How have my other mommy friends dealt with this?  Did anyone else get all worked up like I am? I just miss being close to my husband and we haven't gotten to even sleep in our bed together since we brought Gavin home and it just bothers me. I just miss him. We're normally so affectionate and taking all that down to nearly zero feels awful. I feel like such a fail cause my baby is less than a week old and I already have complaints? Ugh. :( I hope Gavin gets less fussy and sleeps at night soon so we can resume at least a little lovey-doveyness...

Gavin is here!!

Full birth story will come soon!

Closing In...

By now, any readers should be well aware of and have plenty of fair warning of my TMI topics on here. From peeing myself, to lying on my bathroom floor writhing in pain, I've mostly laid it all out there. In case you're unfamiliar, let me warn you now. This entry covers some TMI preggo business. Deal with it.

This morning I had an exciting moment. :D

 I woke up and went to have my morning pee, and when I finished I discovered something. There in the toilet was, well, to spare those unacquainted with pregnancy related terms, I'll just say I found my "show". Rather, a large portion of it. From what I've read, this could signify impending childbirth within hours... or weeks. Ugh. I may have let myself get too excited since I kinda always thought it signified labor within just a few days, at most. But up to a couple weeks? Lame. I'm gonna try to get things moving quicker.

With the "show", it can really only mean I'm continuing to dilate, which is great. I won't find out how much more I'm dilated until the 24th, unless my Dr. gets a cancellation and I can be seen sooner, OR I'm not pregnant anymore.

No matter what my dilation status is though, Gavin is on his way!!

Even More Full Term.

OMG. I'm about to freak out. In this episode of 19 Kids and Counting I'm watching, they find out their 20th baby's heart stopped beating at 18 or 19 weeks. They show them at a routine checkup, the doppler machine on her belly and there's just.... nothing. No sound at all.

I may cry, even if they are friggin crazy and have 19 kids. But hell, I JUST had an appointment this morning and heard Gavin's heart going strong. I have had many appointments and heard his heartbeat over the doppler many times. I can't even IMAGINE going in all happy like any other day, expecting the heartbeat and just hear dead air on the machine. That must feel HORRIBLE. I'm so thankful my nugget has been so healthy and strong and perfect this pregnancy.

On a much happier note, my appointment this morning had some great news. I opted to get checked, and I am already 1cm dilated, and 50% effaced!!! Holy shit. I KNEW it too! Ever since I hit 36 weeks, he's been putting so much pressure straight downwards that I knew he had to be priming my cervix at least somewhat! This great, cause once I'm actually in labor, I'll only have 9cm to dilate til I can start pushing. Haha. So this 1cm with no effort is a nice little way to get ahead of the game!

In one more note, I finally got Gavin's car seat installed! I've been procrastinating on it so bad. I was worried we'd just end up tossing it in the car and installing it right before leaving the hospital, AFTER he was already here. But it's ready, hooray! The weather finally wasn't that cold so I was comfortable to sit outside and figure that thing out. Now my nugget has a safe ride home :)

Full Term & Extremely Whiny.

I may or may not officially be over being pregnant. (Hint: I totally and most certainly am).

I have always consistently known that I'd miss feeling his movements. And that I'll miss the general maternal feelings of protecting and carrying and nurturing my baby. However, I'm really just ready to have my own body back and ready to not experience the daily ailments I've grown used to anymore. I'm just over it all. For one thing, I hate that getting in and out of bed is a painful experience every single time due to my sciatic nerve. As a matter of fact, just recently my sciatic nerve started acting up in a different way, and it's pretty unbearable at times. Definitely not something I can deal with for another two weeks. I'll tell you what, when I get that sweet, delicious epidural, I'll be so goddamn happy to not have to feel that sciatic fucking nerve acting up for several hours.

I seriously hope Gavin comes early, just so I can start getting back to normal. Of course I'll have healing and a new round of bodily experiences to deal with, but that will fade in a few weeks. Some things I've dealt with during pregnancy have effected me almost the entire time I've been knocked up. Seriously, if Gavin came sometime next week, that'd be perfect for me. Or even just anytime after my birthday, which is the 16th.

This week begins my weekly OB appointments. They've gotten more and more closely spaced apart, and now shit starts getting serious. From what I understand, I will probably start getting checked for dilation at this point too. Based on some of the pains and discomforts I've been feeling since 36 weeks, I almost expect to be at least 1cm. But then again, that'd be a long time for me to be dilated and nothing else be going on. I'm still yet to experience, but on standby for any Braxton Hicks contractions, bloody show or anything else that would indicate onset of labor. So yeah. We'll see when he starts showing he's on his way. Other than dropping at 36 weeks, Gavin is still sitting pretty tight. And I'm over it.

One Day Short of Full Term...

and I don't know what this little nugget is up to right now, but I think he needs to quit it!

For the past 3 hours or so, I've had lower back pain. Now, back pain has been completely common in this pregnancy, but it's not usually localized in the lower area. It more so occurs if I'm sitting with poor posture; typically I just get situated sitting straight up with a good pillow or something supporting my back and it feels fine. Boom, problem solved.

This time though, I took 2 tylenols (which I haven't done at ALL this pregnancy) and my back still aches. I'm paying attention for anything that could be contractions, but all I'm getting are normal baby kicks and movements. Nothing crazy or different.

I don't think anything is happening yet. and seriously, it better not! Nick is underway with the boat until friday, so I'd have to try to slow down or just tolerate early labor until he got home in two days. ugh! I'm gonna make sure tonight my hospital bag is packed for sure just in case.. haha.

For right now, I'm gonna take a nice hot shower (one of my favorite things this pregnancy anyway). The heat is always relaxing and it may soothe my stupid back. So we'll see what happens.. hopefully nothing for now! If it is, I'll be able to read this entry and see how it all began... yikes!

The 36th Week.

This week has been my most uncomfortable so far.

I'm nearly positive he started dropping, and he isn't being shy about pushing himself downwards. For that matter, he hasn't been shy about stretching, shifting, and everything else. He's been very active ever since I first have been able to feel him move, but my god. It's crazy these days. It truly feels like he grew a pound overnight; he tries to push for more space all the time and I feel his noggin pressing into me, and his legs pushing upwards and all this crazyness. My belly takes on some crazy shapes at times!

Also, the one terrible complaint I've had since the first trimester is getting worse. I mostly learned to combat my sciatic nerve pain, and figured out how to prevent it almost entirely. But this week, it pretty much just hurts all the time. If I'm moving my left leg, the nerve is hurting. If I'm sitting up, it's hurting, and especially if I'm trying to reposition or rollover in bed, it hurts. 

I'm SO ready to have my body back to myself and to have it start going back to normal. I can't do this much longer anyway; I'm running out of clothes! I have a few wardrobe staples that have lasted me the whole pregnancy, that are now starting to just fit or become a little tight. God dammit. I have large coats I can't button and baggy pajama pants that waistline squeezes too tight. Thank goodness for the oversized lounging tshirts I borrowed from my mom, they're the most comfortable things I have right now! This shit's getting ridic.

Thoughts, Hopes, Dreams.

Gavin's birth is creeping closer and closer these days. I've been debating with the mirror since last night about whether or not he's started to drop.

I swear there's more space at the top of my belly. Comparing with my last belly photo though, there's not a noticeable difference. I feel like I see the difference in person though. Either way, he IS preparing for his debut; at my OB appointment yesterday we did a quick ultrasound to check his position, and he is definitely head DOWN! The ultrasound wasn't all that much to see; basically a large round image, which was his head. and it was right on top of my cervix. So who knows if he'll shift around over the next few weeks, but if he stays put he'll be primed and ready to make things NOT complicated at birth. Like a good boy. :)

One thing on my mind a lot lately is the actual big day. I have a list for my hospital bag, just gotta pack it. I think a lot about what will happen that day; if Nick will be home, or if I'll be able to reach him at work and have him rush to me to go to the hospital, if my mom will be able to make it from MD without any delay.. there's just so much! 

I also think a lot about the birth. How will I do? For years I've always felt like birth was the scariest thing ever; as a teenager I was so glad it was far away, cause it sounded unbearably awful. Now that it's close, of course I have the fear and the thought process of "...fuck I'm suppose to give birth soon aren't I..", but I feel strangely ready and unafraid at the same time. I feel like once I know labor is here, I can totally handle it, at least for awhile. I like to think that I can take contractions head on, like a boss, until I do decide that fuck this I want my epidural. I honestly think that giving birth is one of the most fundamental womanly things a woman does in her life, and I'm excited to join this club that billions of other women are in. I want to be strong and not shrivel into a teary-eyed, whiny mess during his birth (although there's a good chance I will). I don't want to be such a wreck that I can hardly enjoy my new son. I guess I'm just like any other mother out there in that I want to have a smooth, complication-free experience. 

Ideally, I want to get my sweet, sweet epidural and be able to deliver him myself, without all the crazyness of tearing, stitches, cord tangling, buncha crap. Gavin and me have both been doing REALLY well this whole time, and I feel confident he'll be perfect when he gets here. I'm looking forward SO much to that moment he wails his tiny hiney off when his lungs take that first breath. omg. I've been so careful with myself during this pregnancy and have been very mindful of what I take in that I think he'll be just fine. I just hope I'm fine. I hear about some women being able to get up and about within a couple hours of birth and feeling fine, and that's all I can really hope for for myself.